'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2': What the Critics Say

"It ends well," writes THR's Todd McCarthy, while the Telegraph's Philip Womack calls the climactic battle "a genuinely terrifying spectacle."

8:14 PM PDT 7/6/2011 by THR staff

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Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows: Part 2

Jaap Buitendijk/Warner Brothers

Anticipation for the final installment in Warner Bros.' Harry Potter film franchise is running at a fever pitch, and on Wednesday, critics started unveiling their reviews of the movie.

The Hollywood Reporter chief film critic Todd McCarthy wrote that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, which opens July 15, is an "outstanding capper" to the series.

"It ends well," he wrote. "After eight films in 10 years and a cumulative global box-office take of more than $6.3 billion, the most successful franchise in the history of movies comes to an obligatory -- and quite satisfying -- conclusion in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2."

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McCarthy added that the decision to split the final book in J.K. Rowling's series was justified.

"This is an exciting and, to put it mildly, massively eventful finale that will grip and greatly please anyone who has been at all a fan of the series up to now," he wrote. "If ever there was a sure thing commercially, this stout farewell is it."

Philip Womack of the U.K.'s Telegraph adds that fans will be satisfied with the movie.

"Perhaps the greatest triumph of this final film is its ability to overcome the deficiencies of J.K' Rowling’s writing," he wrote. "In the last Harry Potter volume, she failed singularly to muster the epic feel needed; as a result, on the page, the concluding battle at Hogwarts was a damp squib. But Yates here transmutes it into a genuinely terrifying spectacle, as bloodied students fight desperately against a horde of screaming black-robed Death Eaters."

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Grant Rollings of the U.K. newspaper the Sun also had mostly positive things to say about the movie, which he described as "something to be cherished."

"It's an epic movie dust-up with schoolkids and a handful of good witches and wizards fighting to the death against seemingly superior forces of evil," he wrote. "Imagine a more spectacular battle than that of Helm's Deep in Lord of the Rings. It is dizzying and thrilling, even before the story reaches the monumental climax between the brave orphan and Ralph Fiennes' noseless fiend (villain Voldemort)."

His only quibble was with the cast, saying star Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter) is capable of better acting and that Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) and Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) haven't shown any improvement over the past three years. Yet he praises Matthew Lewis (Neville Longbottom), who "steals their thunder."

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